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Vlases v. Montgomery Ward & Co. | 377 F.2d 846 (1967)
Article Two of the Uniform Commercial Code, or U C C, governs sales of goods. Article Two protects buyers by imposing, in appropriate cases, the implied warranties of merchantability and of fitness for a particular purpose. The purpose of the implied warranty of merchantability is to make sure the goods are fit for their ordinary purposes and would pass without objection in the trade. The implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose applies if the seller, at contracting, knows that the buyer needs the goods for a particular purpose, and that the buyer relies on the seller’s skill or judgment to select suitable goods. This warranty requires that the goods be fit for that particular purpose.
If the goods don’t measure up, then the seller is in breach. But suppose the reason the goods fall short is a defect that was scientifically impossible for the seller to discover or remedy before delivery. Should the seller be liable? A purveyor of young chickens found itself in just such an eggs-acting predicament in the plucky case of Vlases versus Montgomery Ward and Company.
Paul Vlases emigrated to the United States when he was sixteen. He worked for many years as a coal miner, raising chickens on the side. When Vlases finally retired from coal mining, he decided to make husbandry of chickens, and selling their eggs, his full-time occupation. To that end, Vlases built a large chicken coop and contracted with Montgomery Ward and Company, or Montgomery, to buy around two thousand newly hatched chicks to fill the coop. A few weeks after taking delivery of the chicks, Vlases noticed that their feathers were falling off.
A veterinarian discovered that most of the chicks were afflicted with, among other ailments, leukosis, a type of deadly cancer. Owing mainly to the leukosis, Vlases lost all the chicks.
All hopes for the chicks thus plucked from his grasp, Vlases promptly sued Montgomery in the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, asserting claims of negligence and breach of the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. Vlases dropped the negligence claim, but the warranty claims went to the jury.
At trial, experts agreed that it was impossible for Montgomery to have discovered the leukosis before delivery, and no medication could’ve prevented the disease. On that basis, Montgomery argued that it couldn’t be liable for breach of warranty. The district court apparently disagreed, instructing the jury that Montgomery was liable if the chicks had leukosis at delivery. The jury so found, and the district court entered judgment for Vlases. Refusing to be henpecked, Montgomery appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.
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